GATE:GiftedandTalentedEducation

At Queenstown Primary School we believe that like all students, gifted learners have particular learning needs. In order to meet the specific needs of this group of students we provide a differentiated curriculum for students that are identified as Gifted and Talented. This is about meeting a basic human right by providing an education that meets the need of the individual.

Identification of these students comes from a range of sources including parent identification, test data, staff identification, performance or clinical testing by a suitably qualified professional.

The areas of gift can be from a range of human endeavour and our programme is based around current international best practice such as Francois Gagne's model which states that the top 10 percent of people across all socio-economic, gender and cultural backgrounds fall into the gifted category and that giftedness can be actual or potential. We also recognise that high potential does not always equate to high academic achievement.

Research clearly states that this cohort of students does best when they get the opportunity to work with "like minds," which is another very important aspect of the GATE programme.

At QPS we provide a range of opportunities facilitated by specialist teachers to attend and take part in passion project based learning where our GATE students get to work with mentors and experts from their chosen field to pursue their area of passion or interest in depth and over time.

We also work on the Affective Development of our students through vertically grouped affective sessions that look at what it means to be gifted and how gifts can be turned into talents. As well as this we facilitate a range of other socratic and philosophic discussions around issues and concerns that are unique to this group of students while assisting them to future proof their learning by developing their "soft skills."

We also aim to teach them social responsibility and the importance of giving back to their community and to society as a whole.